Patient Eludes Staff At Court Hearing

Incident Not Considered Escape, State Official Says

NEW HAVEN — A Connecticut Valley Hospital patient awaiting a court hearing Tuesday slipped past two hospital staff members and left in a waiting car, a hospital official said.

The incident occurred between 10 and 10:45 a.m., but is not considered an escape because the woman is not a court-committed patient, said Robert Taylor, director of safety and security for the Department of Mental Health.

Taylor said the department gave local authorities a Teletype description of the woman and a description of the car and its registration plate. Middletown police identified the woman as Maria Bergen, 27, of Wallingford.

Taylor would not provide details about why the woman was in court except to say it was unrelated to her civil commitment to the hospital.

The woman's disappearance comes a day after Theodore Grooms, a 35-year-old voluntary hospital patient, was reported missing during a supervised excursion to New Haven, and two weeks after Ronald C. Kearney, a court-committed patient considered dangerous, escaped during a supervised outing at a Berlin movie theater. Kearney remained at large Tuesday. Hospital police refused to say whether Grooms had returned.

A report reviewing Kearney's escape and the hospital's community field trip programs is expected to be released next week, Mental Health Commissioner Albert J. Solnit said. Solnit expected the report to be ready Tuesday, but said the department needed more time to review the incident.

New Haven County Chief Deputy Sheriff Frank Kinney said his court deputies were not notified of Bergen's disappearance.

"Our deputy sheriffs would have been happy to assist, but no one ever asked us or reported this to us," said Kinney, whose sheriffs serve as security for the New Haven courts. "It would seem that they would have come to us and asked `Can you help us?' No one came to us."

Taylor said the missing woman is not considered dangerous.

"She is not a fugitive or an escape from custody," Taylor said. "It's listed as an unauthorized absence. We provided a Teletype not because of a degree of dangerousness, but because we feel she needs continued treatment."

Edward Mattison, executive director of the Connecticut Legal Rights Project, said it is a misdemeanor for a civilly committed patient to leave the custody of hospital staff.

Mattison, whose organization protects the rights of patients with mental disorders, described civilly committed patients as those who have been considered to be either a danger to themselves or so gravely mentally disabled that they cannot provide for their own survival